“I’ve got to meet Caroline. Remember, you’re coming to the bachelor dinner day after tomorrow.”
Michael felt the moment slipping away. “Then Caroline’s personal feelings don’t count with you?” he demanded fiercely.
“Caroline’s tired and upset. But she has what she wants, and that’s the main thing.”
“Are you referring to yourself?” demanded Michael incredulously.
“Yes.”
“May I ask how long she’s wanted you?”
“About two years.” Before Michael could answer, he was gone.
During the next two days Michael floated in an abyss of helplessness. The idea haunted him that he had left something undone that would sever this knot drawn tight under his eyes. He phoned Caroline, but she insisted that it was physically impossible for her to see him until the day before the wedding, for which day she granted him a tentative rendezvous. Then he went to the bachelor dinner, partly in fear of an evening alone at his hotel, partly from a feeling that by his presence at that function he was somehow nearer to Caroline, keeping her in sight.
The Ritz Bar had been prepared for the occasion by French and American banners and by a great canvas covering one wall, against which the guests were invited to concentrate their proclivities in breaking glasses.
At the first cocktail, taken at the bar, there were many slight spillings from many trembling hands, but later, with the champagne, there was a rising tide of laughter and occasional bursts of song.
Michael was surprised to find what a difference his new dinner coat, his new silk hat, his new, proud linen made in his estimate of himself; he felt less resentment towards all these people for being so rich and assured. For the first time since he had left college he felt rich and assured himself; he felt that he was part of all this, and even entered into the scheme of Johnson, the practical joker, for the appearance of the woman betrayed, now waiting tranquilly in the room across the hall.
“We don’t want to go too heavy,” Johnson said, “because I imagine Ham’s had a pretty anxious day already. Did you see Fullman Oil’s sixteen points off this morning?”
“Will that matter to him?” Michael asked, trying to keep the interest out of his voice.
“Naturally. He’s in heavily; he’s always in everything heavily. So far he’s had luck; anyhow, up to a month ago.”
The glasses were filled and emptied faster now, and men were shouting at one another across the narrow table. Against the bar a group of ushers was being photographed, and the flash light surged through the room in a stifling cloud
“Now’s the time,” Johnson said. “You’re to stand by the door, remember, and we’re both to try and keep her from coming in—just till we get everybody’s attention.”
He went on out into the corridor, and Michael waited obediently by the door. Several minutes passed. Then Johnson reappeared with a curious expression on his face.
“There’s something funny about this.”
“Isn’t the girl there?”
“She’s there all right, but there’s another woman there, too; and it’s nobody we engaged either. She wants to see Hamilton Rutherford, and she looks as if she had something on her mind.”
They went out into the hall. Planted firmly in a chair near the door sat an American girl a little the worse for liquor, but with a determined expression on her face. She looked up at them with a jerk of her head.
“Well, j’tell him?” she demanded. “The name is Marjorie Collins, and he’ll know it. I’ve come a long way, and I want to see him now and quick, or there’s going to be more trouble than you ever saw.” She rose unsteadily to her feet.
“You go in and tell Ham,” whispered Johnson to Michael. “Maybe he’d better get out. I’ll keep her here.”
Back at the table, Michael leaned close to Rutherford’s ear and, with a certain grimness, whispered:
“A girl outside named Marjorie Collins says she wants to see you. She looks as if she wanted to make trouble.”
Hamilton Rutherford blinked and his mouth fell ajar; then slowly the lips came together in a straight line and he said in a crisp voice:
“Please keep her there. And send the head barman to me right away.”
Michael spoke to the barman, and then, without returning to the table, asked quietly for his coat and hat. Out in the hall again, he passed Johnson and the girl without speaking and went out into the Rue Cambon. Calling a cab, he gave the address of Caroline’s hotel.
His place was beside her now. Not to bring bad news, but simply to be with her when her house of cards came falling around her head.
Rutherford had implied that he was soft—well, he was hard enough not to give up the girl he loved without taking advantage of every chance within the pale of honour. Should she turn away from Rutherford, she would find him there.
She was in; she was surprised when he called, but she was still dressed and would be down immediately. Presently she appeared in a dinner gown, holding two blue telegrams in her hand. They sat down in armchairs in the deserted lobby.
“But, Michael, is the dinner over?”
“I wanted to see you, so I came away.”
“I’m glad.” Her voice was friendly, but matter-of-fact. “Because I’d just phoned your hotel that I had finings and rehearsals all day tomorrow. Now we can have our talk after all.”
“You’re tired,” he guessed. “Perhaps I shouldn’t have come.”
“No. I was waiting up for Hamilton. Telegrams that may be important. He said he might go on somewhere, and that may mean any hour, so I’m glad I have someone to talk to.”
Michael winced at the impersonality in the last phrase.
“Don’t you care when he gets home?”
“Naturally,” she said, laughing, “but I haven’t got much say about it, have it?”
“Why not?”
“I couldn’t start by telling him what he could and couldn’t do.”
“Why not?”
“He wouldn’t stand for it.”
“He seems to want merely a housekeeper,” said Michael ironically.
“Tell me about your plans, Michael,” she asked quickly.
“My plans? I can’t see any future after the day after tomorrow. The only real plan I ever had was to love you.”
Their eyes brushed past each other’s, and the look he knew so well was staring out at him from hers. Words flowed quickly from his heart:
“Let me tell you just once more how well I’ve loved you, never wavering for a moment, never thinking of another girl. And now when I think of all the years ahead without you, without any hope, I don’t want to live, Caroline darling. I used to dream about our home, our children, about holding you in my arms and touching your face and hands and hair that used to belong to me, and now I just can’t wake up.”
Caroline was crying softly. “Poor Michael—poor Michael.” Her hand reached out and her fingers brushed the lapel of his dinner coat. “I was so sorry for you the other night. You looked so thin, and as if you needed a new suit and somebody to take care of you.” She sniffled and looked more closely at his coat. “Why, you’ve got a new suit! And a new silk hat! Why, Michael, how swell!” She laughed, suddenly cheerful through her tears. “You must have come into money, Michael; I never saw you so well turned out.”
For a moment, at her reaction, he hated his new clothes.
“I have come into money,” he said. “My grandfather left me about a quarter of a million dollars.”
“Why, Michael,” she cried, “how perfectly swell! I can’t tell you how glad I am. I’ve always thought you were the sort of person who ought to have money.”
“Yes, just too late to make a difference.”
The revolving door from the street groaned around and Hamilton Rutherford came into the lobby. His face was flushed, his eyes were restless and impatient.
“Hello, darling; hello, Mr. Curly.” He bent and kissed Caroline. “I broke away for a minute to find out if I had any telegrams. I see you’ve got them there.” Taking them from her, he remarked to Curly, “That was an odd business there in the bar, wasn’t it? Especially as I understand some of you had a joke fixed up in the same line.” He opened one of the telegrams, closed it and turned to Caroline with the divided expression of a man carrying two things in his head at once.
“A girl I haven’t seen for two years turned up,” he said. “It seemed to be some clumsy form of blackmail, for I haven’t and never have had any sin of obligation towards her whatever.”
“What happened?”
“The head barman had a Surete Generale man there in ten minutes and it was settled in the hall. The French blackmail laws make ours look like a sweet wish, and I gather they threw a scare into her that she’ll remember. But it seems wiser to tell you.”
“Are you implying that I mentioned the matter?” said Michael stiffly.
“No,” Rutherford said slowly. “No, you were just going to be on hand. And since you’re here, I’ll tell you some news that will interest you even more.”
He handed Michael one telegram and opened the other.
“This is in code,” Michael said.
“So is this. But I’ve got to know all the words pretty well this last week. The two of them together mean I’m due to start life all over.”
Michael saw Caroline’s face grow a shade paler, but she sat quiet as a mouse.
“It was a mistake and I stuck to it too long,” continued Rutherford.
